One well known method of encoding a gray image decomposes the digital representation of the image into bitplanes. Each of the bitplanes carries the bit values associated with its level of resolution or importance, for example, the most significant bitplane carries the most significant bits that form the image. Bitplane decomposition is commonly employed in systems where it is desired to store or transmit a gray-level image in a progressive fashion. That is where the most important information (most likely contained in the most significant bitplane) needed for scene recognition is stored or transmitted first, followed by the remaining bitplanes in descending order. Such a scheme is useful for real-time applications where it is desirable to browse through a collection of images while retaining the capability of terminating the reconstruction during decoding to proceed to the next image. In order to decrease memory storage space and the amount of transmission time needed to handle these images, binary image compression techniques are applied to each of the individual bitplanes. The extent to which these techniques effectively compress the bitplanes will determine the speed at which a stored or transmitted image can be displayed.